ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

Was not really sure where to put this, but this seems to be where a bunch of other guide-type things are, so here this is.


You may have discovered upon looking up an error while playing the game that the only solution given is to delete "world.teaw" from the save folder. However, it is not so simple as that on Steam and with cloud synchronization.

Deleting "world.teaw" is apparently the sledgehammer fix for several specific errors, such as the game stopping when trying to load lore from previous characters at the fortress library, so I figured I would write a short way of how actually do it with Steam when one is called upon to delete the file. I only ever play this game on Windows, so I have no idea how it would be done on other systems. And turning off cloud synchronisation is a non-option for me (and doesn't even work by itself), as Steam no longer has an option to turn it off or on for individual games--it's either on for all games, or on for none.

This file is stored in 3 different spots if running the Steam version and using cloud synchronization:

D1: the primary save directory, where the game primarily reads/writes from
D2: a copy of the Steam cloud within the Steam directory
D3: the Steam cloud

Simply deleting the file from D1 does not work. The game will copy and use the file from D2 if the file is not found in D1 (even if cloud synch is turned off in Steam, the game will still copy from D2 in this case for some reason).

Simply deleting the file from both D2 and D1 does not work. Steam will download the file from D3 to D2 when the game starts up, then the game will grab it from D2 and copy it to D1 as before.


There are 2 methods I have found to dealing with this issue.

Method 1:
1: start the game up
2: delete the file from both D1 and D2 while on the main menu
3: either load or start a new game
4: save the game, which should generate a new "world.teaw" and be copied to both D1 and D2, which will then synch to D3 upon close of game

Method 2:
1: delete the file from all 3 locations


Where are the 3 locations of the file?

D1, the primary save directory, is in the user directory on windows. It should be something like:


D2, the cloud copy, is in the Steam directory on windows. It should be something like:


D3, the Steam cloud, can be accessed with a third-party program. I used Steam Cloud File Manager Lite, which can be found at https://github.com/GMMan/SteamCloudFile ... e/releases
1: download and unzip the program somewhere
2: make sure Steam is running and logged in
3: run SteamCloudFileManager.exe
4: in the AppID field, use ToME4's appid of 259680
5: click connect
6: find "tome/save/world.teaw" and highlight it
7: click delete

Alternatively just disable steam cloud as it causes a lot of bugs.

Source : use steam, don't use steam cloud, can just delete world.teaw in game directory and fix things with no other steps

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I write guides and make addons too now, apparently

You can go here for a compilation of everything I wrote, plus some other important stuff!

Includes general guides (inscriptions, zone, prodigies), and class guides (Demo, Anorithil, Bulwark, Zerker, Sblade)

As explained in the OP, simply disabling Steam cloud doesn't work. The game will still pull the file from the Steam cloud copy on the disk for some reason even if Steam cloud is disabled. So if Steam cloud is disabled at a point where "world.teaw" is already broken, the broken file will just get copied back if it is only deleted from the primary save directory.

Also, as stated in the OP, Steam cloud can no longer be disabled for individual games. It can only be disabled for all games or for none. Personally, I cannot just turn off a huge convenience because of just one game.

As explained in my post it works for me so you can't say "simply disabling it doesn't work" :p

And since when can't you disable steam cloud on a game per game basis? I'll check but i recently (christmas/new year) used it for a game and yet i had to copy ToME savefiles manually.

_________________
I write guides and make addons too now, apparently

You can go here for a compilation of everything I wrote, plus some other important stuff!

Includes general guides (inscriptions, zone, prodigies), and class guides (Demo, Anorithil, Bulwark, Zerker, Sblade)

The thing is, if you have ever had Steam cloud enabled and played the game at some point with it on a computer, there is likely a "world.teaw" in the copy of the Steam cloud on the disk. So if the "world.teaw" in the Steam cloud copy on the disk is a "broken" one, the game will still copy that one into the primary save directory if the "world.teaw" is not there (such as deleting it out of the primary save directory) even if Steam cloud is disabled for some odd reason. This was the issue with trying to delete the file in this thread: viewtopic.php?f=42&t=49336

Attached is all the Steam cloud options within its UI currently (a single checkbox for all games). There is no right-clicking on the game and going into its options to disable cloud saves for an individual game anymore.

Yeah, I'm gonna have to disagree again.




Admitedly some of my games don't have it anymore somehow ?

And I had Steam Cloud enabled for a while, until it - me over twice and i figured out it was the culprit.

So I'm glad you found a workaround to your issue obviously, but I'll still recommend trying the simple approach before trying yours anyway ^^

_________________
I write guides and make addons too now, apparently

You can go here for a compilation of everything I wrote, plus some other important stuff!

Includes general guides (inscriptions, zone, prodigies), and class guides (Demo, Anorithil, Bulwark, Zerker, Sblade)

That option does not exist for me, as can be seen in the attached screenshot. And having done quite a bit of research whilst figuring all this crap out, it appears it is the same for most as well. For you, however, it may be like that because you had individually disabled cloud saves before the UI change and Steam left that part open for those with that particular flag. Or you haven't updated Steam in a while and are just in offline mode so it never updates the Steam client with the change. For the rest of us, we get all or nothing as far as I can tell.

Edit: also, after figuring all this stuff out, I don't see how Steam cloud really messes anything up. It has some quirks, and yeah, was pretty iffy in the past, but nothing really detrimental now. Though I am curious how it behaves near the storage limit. I may have to play with that bit.

Edit2: seems I was correct with you having disabled it individually before the UI change. I just remembered that I disabled cloud saves for Skyrim long before the UI change, and looked up in the game properties of that to find what is in the second attachment.

Edit3: I may have to eat my words. I just found a game I know for certain that I got after the UI change, and it has the option to individually enable or disable cloud saves on it. I'll have to delve into seeing what actually triggers that. Though I still see no need to disable cloud saves on ToME4 though (if you are one who can actually disable/enable it individually), especially after figuring out how the cloud works. Unless there's some specific use cases where it actually breaks things? I'd like to know those, because I have encountered zero.

The problem that happens is :
1) play online, cloud saves, ToME saves.
2) play offline, ToME saves.
3) launch the game online, steam charge cloud save, delete ToME save.
4) enjoy ! You're back 1, 10, 20 levels!

_________________
I write guides and make addons too now, apparently

You can go here for a compilation of everything I wrote, plus some other important stuff!

Includes general guides (inscriptions, zone, prodigies), and class guides (Demo, Anorithil, Bulwark, Zerker, Sblade)

I don't get it. What happens in step 3 to delete a save? I have played offline a ton before this last year, and never had issues when going back to online mode. A good chunk of my character sheets even had the flag "may have played offline", or whatever it was, before that line was removed altogether.

the cloud save erase and replace local save

that's a very common problem and the reason when you go on steam forum you find a ton of post about it and 5 different people saying right away to disabe cloud saves for ToME and never look back.

_________________
I write guides and make addons too now, apparently

You can go here for a compilation of everything I wrote, plus some other important stuff!

Includes general guides (inscriptions, zone, prodigies), and class guides (Demo, Anorithil, Bulwark, Zerker, Sblade)

I've discovered that deleting world.teaw will reset achievement tracking for multi-character achievements such as Reaver and A Fistful of Demons. I talk about that in a little more detail in my original bug report topic about the library issue here: viewtopic.php?f=42&t=49336#p234504.